But If It Were False
by KayFortnight
Summary: Third book of the I Do Recall series, which attempts to play with the popular Peggy Sue trope, where someone, usually Harry, goes back in time and attempts to fix things. In the Recallverse, everyone goes back, via a dream showing the future. Everyone remembers. This brings about some changes. AU. Warnings: char death, violence, eventual non explicit het and homo relationships.
1. Doors Shut

Honest comment: I think I may have been too bold with all this. I was trying to emulate the greats of the HP fanverse, but maybe I took on too much. I'm still going to try to finish it, but I'm going to be less hard on myself and stop wanting it to be perfect.

I don't own Harry Potter.

* * *

On a muggy day late in July, a Wednesday, to be exact, the doors to Gringotts shut. Witches and wizards tried them, grumbled, and swore, until one of the passerby shouted, "It's one of their holy days, ain't it?" Then they would walk away, privately thinking uncharitable thoughts about the passerby who'd actually paid enough attention in History of Magic to know when the goblin holy days were.

It was, in fact, a British Goblin holiday, albeit one of their stranger ones. In past millenia, said day was devoted to sacrificing their enemies and feasting on their flesh, but modern wizards frowned on that, and anyway, the youth these days would probably just slather still beating hearts in ketchup, and what was the point of wasting a perfectly good heart that way? So the goblins had seized the opportunity when the human wizards quenched the one hundred and sixty-third goblin rebellion on said holiday, and decided to officially change it to Veneration of our Benevolent Overlords Day. The humans were rather confused by this, because compared to goblins, humans have a severely underdeveloped sense of sarcasm. The goblins mostly used it as an excuse to drink overpowered firewhiskey and build complicated traps for fun. After all, maybe they'd need that jet of flame, if the burglar survived the poison spikes, crushing rocks, and Dark curses that came before, of course.

The goblins find it sweetly ironic that this is the day the whatever-number-we're-at-now rebellion begins.

When the doors didn't open on Thursday, few wizards noticed. It was not a big business day, so other than those who actually worked at Gringotts, and the few in the know, everyone assumed it was another goblin holiday and walked away, patting themselves on their back for their amazing cultural sensitivity. Bill Weasley and his fellow curse breakers, however, went shopping, for canned goods, floo powder, and medical potions, got change in muggle pounds, and hurried home to their families with their hands near their wands.

When the doors didn't open on Friday… well. Friday was the Ministry payday. Since the Ministry employed a solid quarter of the wizarding populace, this meant Friday was a very busy day at the bank, normally.

Since everyone was working, the mob didn't form until half-past noon. At two, the aurors came to see why no one had returned to work. At 2:05, the aurors gave a pale, shaking man from the Goblins Liason Office a Incorporeality potion and told him to "Buck up, if you'd been doing your job properly in the first place this wouldn't happen."

At 2:06 p.m. his hand got trapped in the door, which had apparently been enchanted with a spell against Incorporeality potions. At 2:07 p.m. an Auror used a well-placed diffindo to cut his hand off.

At ten past, a healer arrived, took one look at the bleeding man, another at the hand still stuck in the door, and muttered, "God save us from trigger happy aurors."

At half past, an auror attempted to open the door by throwing a curse at it.

At half past and one minute, the healer had a second patient to treat.

By three, Minister Fudge had a headache.

* * *

Remus glanced up from his coffee when Sirius entered the living room of the London flat, clutching a newspaper. Harry was over at a friend's place for a couple of days, so Sirius and Remus had decided it would be a good idea to spend some time together so they could see how effective Sirius's therapy had been. If he was dealing well enough day to day, maybe they could all move into Grimmauld Place. The Unplottable status would be supremely beneficial, especially given Harry's loss of blood protection. The only reason Dumbledore had allowed Harry to move to the London flat with them over the summer was because Remus had pointed out Hogwarts would be the first place any enemies would look, and even then, the sheer level of wards they'd placed on the flat made his hair stand on end.

Sirius flopped down on the well-worn couch besides him, and pointed to the paper. "The goblins are rebelling again. What is this, the millionth time? How do they think it'll go any better than the previous ones?"

Remus sipped at his coffee. "I did tell you and Harry to get your money out of the bank," he said levelly.

Sirius blinked, then slowly set the newspaper down. "That you did. You knew."

"They're tired, of not being allowed wands, of not being able to get jobs outside of Gringotts, of whispers calling them money-grubbing and venal wherever they may go. Sound familiar?"

"Somehow, when you said you were going to try to fix things for werewolves, I thought you meant you'd protest or something," Sirius replied, with a little laugh.

Remus finally looked over at him. "This is a protest. The only sort the Wizarding World will listen to," he said. "Everything's picking up pace, now, all due to the house elf thing. There was that article last week, do you remember?"

Sirius nodded. "The decree that will make it illegal to enslave them, yes. It'll never pass."

"I wouldn't be so sure. You didn't see how many of the oppressed we have working together, Sirius. It's a snowball on a mountainside, now, but by the time it hits the ground, it'll be an avalanche."

"It will be good to see you finally able to have the life you deserve, then."

Remus smiled slightly, even as he stared into the depths of his coffee. "I do hope it isn't too hard on Tonks," he murmured. "She'd be a full-fledged Auror by now, and Diagon Alley must be a mess from all this."

* * *

Drip... Drip.

Drip… Drip.

Sometimes he fantasizes. If the dripping were to stop, he believes, maybe everything would be okay.

Drip...Drip.

He puts his ragged shred of a shirt under it one day. It helps, for perhaps an hour.

Drip...Drop.

Altered timbre, tone, tempo perhaps… he'd always been a terrible musician, despite all the lessons. Gentle on the keys, boy. How many times can you forget the notes, boy. Have you no bloody ear for music, boy.

Drip drop drip drop drip drop drip.

But still the same song.

"Help me, help me, help me," he harmonizes as he stumbles over to the drip...drop. The ceiling is low, but not so low that he can reach the source, no matter how he stretches. He catches the water in his hands, instead. Some of the color lifts. He stares. He'd almost forgotten his hands weren't naturally crusty red-brown blood splotched with grey dust. The paleness is a little moon of his own, to have and to hold. A moon and an ocean, he thinks dizzily. Drip drop drip drop plop grows the ocean.

It runs over.

"No, no, no…" He adds his other hand, but no matter how tightly he holds it, the water runs through his fingers. "Help me, help me," he chants.

The ocean, the moon are his only companions. They can't leave him like this.

He shuffles back, yanks the shirt away from the ground.

Drip… drip.

Drip… drip.

It's all he has left.


	2. Days Darken

Mrs. Weasley crossed her arms over her chest, planted firmly in front of the Floo. "No Zonkos," said she, and the twins gave a mutual cry of dismay, "Or broom shops," here Ginny winced, "Or books you aren't required to get for your studies."  
Percy's head snapped up. "But-"

"No," she snapped. "You're all old enough to understand the situation we're in, even you, Ginny. Ours and Bill's funds are tied up in Gringotts. Charlie's sent money from Romania, otherwise you wouldn't be making it to Hogwarts this year, understand? You don't need potions ingredients or anything because Bill picked those up when he realized the situation was going south, but you do still need robes and textbooks. Listen, your father's working overtime for no extra pay because everyone keeps trying to charm muggle devices to do things they can no longer afford to buy with wizarding money, we don't want Charlie sending us any more money, and Bill can't leave the house because they want him to work on the Gringotts break in and I'm not sacrificing him to that, that meat grinder!"

Percy bit his lower lip. "How many have they lost to the curses in the entrance hall?" he asked quietly. "I heard that the curses on the door were non-lethal…"

Quietly, behind him, Bill said, "That's because the curses on the door were a warning." Percy turned to look at him. "I could hear your shouting all the way upstairs, Ma. You sure you don't want me coming with?"

"No, we'll be fine," she said. "We're staying together, though, and no unnecessary spending."

And so they followed her through the Floo into the main street of Diagon Alley.

Fortescue's ice cream shop was boarded up, despite the humid heat of late August weighing down the air. Out of Business, read the sign. Students shopping turned away from Madame Malkin's and Olivander's, instead making their way to junk shops and peddlers offering second hand robes and wands. The Aurors had set up a cordon down the street around Gringotts, from which smoke or loud bangs occasionally emanated.

A middle aged man approached an elderly female Auror on the side closest to them. "I haven't been paid in three weeks, and the Minestry ain't doing nothing. Aren't you Auror folks suppose' to protect us from the likes of them goblins?" A crack of apparition sounded in the center of the cordon. "And what're you doing letting the likes of them in?"

The likes of them, a wearied healer with a dark mark on their arm criss-crossed with scars, as if once, when they were young, they'd tried to forcibly dig the reminder of past crimes out of their arm, paled and rushed towards Gringotts, shouting, "I haven't seen this spell since the war! Jonesy, I know you know some healing magic, I'll need help!"

The elderly auror clenched her teeth and followed. "Someone else handle this numbskull!"

Percy swallowed as another auror filled in the gap, and said, "I'd heard St. Mungo's was at full capacity."

"It's worse than I thought," Mum confirmed.

* * *

Gilderoy Lockhart, twelve time winner of Witch Weekly's Most Handsome Wizard in Britain, head of the Light Eternal, candidate for the position of Minister of Magic, and terrorist, met with the Dark Lord one Thursday night in an unassuming Russian Muggle bar. This would have still run the risk of discovery, if each had not come polyjuiced.

Of course, originally, he met with Rita Skeeter (also a terrorist). She lounged casually on a barstool, actually a he at the moment, an Indian man with literal rose-colored glasses. Certainly distinctive, at any rate. Then again, Gilderoy couldn't talk, disguised as he was as a young woman with scarlett hair and a penchant for lime green minidresses. He sat primly on the stool besides Rita and gave a saucy wink. "Why, you look the sort to drink fine champagne, not beer fermented in a pig's trough."

Rita raised an eyebrow. "And you look like you should be selling your wares on a street corner, Madame."

Gilderoy clapped a hand to his heart. "I'll have you know you couldn't afford me, Sir." He leaned forward, and whispered out of the corner of his mouth, "Especially not with the bank closed." He smiled, coquettishly fluttering his eyelashes.

Rita frowned pensively. "About that… What are you thinking, doing business without my input?"

What? Gilderoy frowned. "I'll have you know I always get you your cut," he huffed, "And I always have the Boss's best interests in mind."

Rita sipped her beer. "Then why's the money stopped?"

The bank? Rita thought the bank was his fault? "You're telling me you didn't send competition to my turf?" Gilderoy pushed a lock of hair behind his shoulder. How did women always put up with it getting in the way, anyway?

A flash of surprise lit up Rita's eyes. "You're telling me-" Abruptly, she remembered her persona, and said, fist tightening, "If I find out you've been holding out on me-"

Gilderoy raised his hands defensively. "I swear, I can't do anything when any old Susie-come-lately shows up with…" shit, what weapons did Muggles use again? "blasters and sabers?" He said hopefully.

Rita gave him a flat stare, then whispered, "What the hell happened? I can't understand a word of that."

"Another goblin rebellion," he replied, and almost as an afterthought, tacked on, "Obliviate."

The Boss would probably chose to take more extreme measures than Rita would to fix this. Besides, he could tell her mind was starting to slip from the spells.

Not-Rita blinked, then smiled. "Well, this is certainly better. Now, why do we care about the creatures, anyway?"

"Because when they're rebelling, the entire economy crashes?" Lockhart pointed out.

"So?"

Lockhart blinked. He'd forgotten the Dark Lord didn't exactly have normal priorities. He cast about for an implication that the most evil wizard alive would actually care about. "So people don't have time to care about the Light Eternal versus the Death Eaters," he said. "They're too busy making sure they'll still be able to put food on the table. People are working longer hours to keep the few jobs there are. There's a lot of dissent aimed at the Minister, and maybe that dissent will bring them together. Even if it can't, if I succeed in becoming Minister, I might not be able to fix this, and then everything might fall apart." He paused and thought about that. "Or rather, everyone might band together."

Not-Rita frowned. "Maybe we could kill the goblins."

Lockhart gave her a flat stare. "How exactly would that help?"

"Well, they'd be dead. Dead bodies usually don't cause problems."

Lockhart closed his eyes. "I think massacring an entire nation might cause a few problems, my lord." A beeping horn that faded into the wail of a siren sounded outside. "Well, shit," said Lockhart. "Someone called the police on us."  
"Can't we just kill them?" Not-Rita suggested.

Lockhart gritted his teeth. "Go into the bathroom," he whispered, "and Disapparate. Murder would raise too many questions."

* * *

Tonks knocked on the door of Number 12 Grimmauld Place. Apparently the reveal of its location in the dream world was enough to allow her to see it.

Sirius opened the door. He looked better each time she saw him- healthier, like he was slowly shedding the last vestiges of Azkaban. "Oh," he said. "Hi again, Tonks."

"Wotcher, Sirius," she said. "Is Remus around?"

He furrowed his brow. "You know what, I'm tired of him avoiding you. Come on in."

He shut the door behind them. "He's in the kitchen," he said. "Stove broke in that crappy muggle apartment he's been living in. I'll uh… be somewhere else."

She laughed at that, and called after his retreating back, "Sirius… Thanks."

"I've been waiting for him to stop ignoring you for two years now, cousin. Just don't kill him. Azkaban's no fun."

She knew the way to the kitchen just fine. Enough order missions had been held there that she could probably walk the halls with her eyes closed.

The door was open. Inside, Remus had his back to it, carefully adding spices to a pot, stirred magically with a wooden ladle.

She stepped close. "You've been avoiding me," she said, and the pepper shaker slipped out of his fingers to clunk into the pot.

" _Aguamenti,_ " he cast, extinguishing the fires beneath his ruined dinner. "Tonks."

"So you hadn't forgotten me," she said. "I thought you might have, when you didn't respond to a single of my letters."

He looked younger than she remembered, but then, he was younger than she remembered, wasn't he? In the dream world, it would still be another year and a half or so until they met properly, and even longer until they fell in what she'd thought was love.

He leaned against the stove, brow furrowed with worry. That, at least, was familiar. "I thought it'd be better if we parted ways."

She crossed her arms over her chest. "Better for me, you mean. I thought we'd gotten over this bullcrap."

"It was a dream, you know. Not all of it made sense, and just because we know what happened doesn't mean it feels like we really lived it."

Tonks sighed. "Remus, you're one of the bravest, kindest men I know. If you still love me, you deserve me."

He reached for her, then changed his mind and dropped his hand. "It's not just that. It was at the beginning, but not now."

"Then what?" she asked. "What's changed, Remus? For all that's different, we're still in the same clusterfuck of a situation we were in during the dream."

"I can't tell you."

"Can't or won't?"

He hesitated. "If I tell you, you'll be obligated as an Auror to haul me in for questioning."

Tonks blinked. "Remus… what the hell have you gotten yourself involved in?"

"It's not immoral," he said. "But it's certainly illegal."

And the way he said that… he was by no means jokingly confessing to jaywalking.

"Remus," she said. "Are people getting hurt because of it?"

He looked away, and that answered everything. "What the hell, Remus? The man I fell in love with would have never-"

"Maybe I'm not the man you fell in love with anymore! Maybe I'm tired of being worth less for something I can't control!"

She clenched her fists. "Dammit, Remus. You talk like I'm some spoiled little witchlet who's never faced trouble! You haven't been there to hear the whispers in the hallways, about that Auror Tonks and how she's one step away from turning Dark and needing to be taken care of like all those other undesirables. You stand there, your comrade's blood soaking into your shoes despite your best efforts to protect them, and then get back to the office and hear all this bullshit about how you were too slow to react because you wanted them to get hit. You watch them let off a colleague who killed a Dark kid. You think I don't understand feeling worthless?"

"At least you can get a job."

"Remus," she said. "Remus, I still love you. Damn me, but I do."

"I…" he said, and fell silent. His gaze … there was something of recognition in it. Maybe he hadn't realized he'd fallen out of love, if you could call love stemming from a dream love, until now. Maybe she'd had more hero worship this time around than anything, without the time to grow properly into love.

She understood his response without him needing to say it, and turned away. "I see. For what we had before… I'm going to leave before I hear something I have to arrest you for."

"Tonks. I'm sorry."

"Me too."


End file.
